


Home's a Long, Long Way from Us

by LaVoileBlanche



Series: Outside the world seems a violent place [2]
Category: Class (TV 2016)
Genre: Character Study, Gen, Homesickness, POV Miss Quill, References to Rhodia, Stargazing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-06
Updated: 2016-11-06
Packaged: 2018-08-29 10:21:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,172
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8485636
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LaVoileBlanche/pseuds/LaVoileBlanche
Summary: Miss Quill is in the back garden, heedless of the chill, looking up at the stars and trying to work out how far away her planet is.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Title from Bruce Springsteen's 'Devils and Dust'

Miss Quill is in the back garden, heedless of the chill, looking up at the stars and trying to work out how far away her planet is. She doesn't turn at the sound of the back door sliding open, or at the princeling’s voice as he calls out to her.

“What are you doing?”

Charlie Smith, such an incongruously average name from a boy she knows is capable of atrocities this planet could only dream of. The heir to the Rhodian throne, and enslaver of her people - a teenage boy in fluffy slippers.

“Unless your life is in danger, I don't see that that's any of your business,” Quill tells him, without taking her gaze from the sky. In this city, it is frustratingly opaque, obscured by centuries of pollution, and she can make out only a handful of the brightest constellations. To her annoyance, Charlie comes to stand beside her; when she sneaks a glance at him, he’s wearing his sleepwear, and over it, an oversized jacket that she assumes belongs to the human that’s staying with them now. He’s also holding a steaming mug, and she frowns at the unfamiliar scent of it.

“What’s that?” She asks, nodding slightly towards it.

“This?” He takes a sip. “It’s called hot chocolate. Matteusz showed me how to make it.”

She almost rolls her eyes at the pride in his tone. How embarrassing it is, to think that this sentimental  _ boy  _ had had a race like the Quill under his heel back on their home planet.

“Oh yes? And where is loverboy now? I thought you were attached at the hip.” She’s becoming well accustomed to the way the Earthlings speak; she is better at understanding them than he is, and it's something she is certainly resentful enough to flaunt when she can.

“In the house,” Charlie says. It has not escaped Quill’s notice that he rarely, if ever, calls it home. “He’s sleeping.”

“And you should be, too,” she says, wanting her solitude back. “I think I’m going to set a really nasty test in the morning. You’ll need all the sleep you can get.”

She glances at him again, to see if he will rise to the bait, but he’s looking up at the stars, and doesn't seem to have heard her.

“Do you miss it often?” He asks. It’s not callous, and that is the most surprising thing about it. She has given him no reason to like her, and likewise, she has a hard time summoning anything but repulsion at the thought of his company, but still, he asks her this only out of curiosity. 

“What does it matter to you?” She says, “It isn't as though we can go back.”

“I know. I was just wondering.”

“Of course I miss it,” Quill says. “You would have to be a fool not to, comparing it to this dump.”

“It’s not so bad, here,” Charlie says. His tone is still not argumentative, still does not incite Quill to a hostile response, and it is making her very wary.

“Why, just because you’ve found a boyfriend?” She makes sure the last word is dripping with derision, but it does not have the desired effect. Charlie only smiles into the rim of his mug. “Please, spare me.”

“There’s other things,” he says. “We didn't have such sweet foods on Rhodia. And I know you like Earth coffee.”

“Oh yes, of course, because the genocide of my people was entirely worth it for a bar of chocolate and a cup of boiled bean water,” she snaps. 

“Of course it wasn't,” he says. Souls, how she hates his composure. She wants to see it break, to see the same boy who had cried at admitting the Cabinet’s emptiness. She wants to enjoy his weakness. “I was simply trying to point out that there are worlds outside our own. We don't have to be miserable here.”

“ _ I  _ wasn't miserable there, until I was forced to serve you,” she says, and Charlie sighs, finally looks at her.

“You knew what the punishment would be, when you attacked my people,” he says, and he’s filled with that righteousness that makes her want to slit his throat, Ahn be damned.

He looks away from her again, up at the moon which hangs like a bauble against the black fabric of night.

“Perhaps, if things had gone differently, if the Shadowkin had never attacked, we might have worked towards peace together,” he continues, and she sneers.

“Oh,  _ please _ ,” she says. “You would have been no better than your parents, content to exploit my people to the point of ruination.”

He turns a frown on her, and she feels a vindictive rush at the crease in his brow. Good, that she can provoke this in him. Good that he can feel anything at all besides the harmless cheer he puts on around these humans. When he is angry, he is easier to loathe.

“I am not my parents,” he says, “and your people might have benefitted from my rule. We could have had an alliance.”

Quill has no interest in hearing this. No matter the prince’s espoused intentions, they are both still trapped here on this little blue marble, and she is still a slave.

“It doesn't matter,” she says, and he opens his mouth to argue, then closes it again.

“No,” he says, “I suppose not.”

They go back to star-gazing in silence. The stars are all wrong here, of course, so it is wasted trying to see their planet, but it does not stop Quill from trying.

“Do you?” She asks it suddenly, without really knowing she is going to. Charlie looks at her, cocking his head in confusion. She rolls her eyes. “Miss it.”

“Sometimes I miss it more than I can bear.” He admits it quietly, more to his drink than to her, but she hears it. And she doesn't know what to say to it. It reminds her that he is a refugee on this ridiculous planet just as much as she is, and it makes her so angry she can't think of a single scathing comment. Sometimes, she curses the Rhodians for what they have done to her, and sometimes she curses the Doctor for abandoning her here. It is infuriating beyond belief that she may not be alone in the second instance.

Charlie sighs again.

“I’m going back to bed,” he says, and starts to walk away.

“Didn't ask, and don't care,” she calls after him automatically. She hears the slide of the door closing behind him, and pictures him wiping his slippered feet against the mat before he creeps backs to his bed, and tucks himself in against his human’s side. She imagines he sleeps soundly, and hates him for it.

Up, far above her head, the stars still shine in their alien patterns. She looks at them for a long, long moment more, feeling utterly alone. Then, she returns indoors with a straight, uncompromising spine, and she does not look back.

**Author's Note:**

> Charlie and Miss Quill's dynamic is one of the most interesting parts of the show so far - I just wanted to explore it a little. This was written before episode 4, so forgive me if you think, bearing in mind those developments, it's OOC. 
> 
> As always, bookmarks, comments and kudos are all appreciated, and if you want to chat, I can be found at queer-z0mbies.tumblr.com.
> 
> Again, thanks to failed2be-chill for her encouragement <3


End file.
